Joseph M Pankiewicz, you are a disgrace to this hobby!
 

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Going to hell in a handbasket
 

Well, THAT was some interesting morning reading!! :eek:

And more than a tad depressing. :(

Seems like this Joseph guy has some nice items at auction, click on auction links. Darn I missed bidding on that 1961 Topps complete set. I used to love watching Groucho on You Bet Your Life, today's phrase is "screen capture". I was a decent cross country runner in high school living in Passiac. I was dating this girl from Cedar Grove and my best time for the 8 mile run was 44:48, anyone impressed?

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Josep...18125758251089

It just goes to show that even low grade cards can be altered, improved, whatever word you like.

One of you old school Jersey guy's needs to "Go find Joey and do him up"...

I think that "Joey" is the old school Jersey guy.... I think this thing runs deep - maybe even Tony Soprano has his hand in it...

Nah, Joey doesn't have an Italian last name...:)...

I am not sure anyone ever said they can't be. I think the term I have used is something like "more prevalent"... in high grade cards. Even that is debateable but that would be my assumption due to many factors.

This guy must have a passion for the hobby, according to his facebook page he is a grader at SGC!

https://www.facebook.com/joe.pankiewicz

That's quite interesting?!

I sense dung heading for a fan?!

IF it's true, would you be surprised?

Hello all. In fairness to SGC, I emailed this thread to its owner, who read it and confirmed in email to me that Joe Pankiewicz is NOT an employee of SGC and has not been for many years.

I am posting this as I did not want to see SGC unfairly get hit with fallout from the wrath of these threads.

regards
Ken Goldin

For the record, my post was not a swipe at SGC in any form. But a grader from a TPG (even in the past) would have advantages in buying/selling cards over the average Joe (pun intended). Let me give you an example:





http://tinyurl.com/n26j9a3



http://tinyurl.com/n72kbpg

Y'all can draw your own conclusions. Anyone know how long ago he departed as a grader and the reason why?

" pank hasn't worked for SGC in over 10 years"

That's the quote

Wow! :eek:

Pank won that PSA 4 Robinson and magically bumped it to an SGC 6.5? Wow!

Then he shilled it in Probstein's auction the second time around!

It's all right there in the bid history. His new eBay name is cgseller89 (he just changed it) with a feedback of 402.

I would like SGCs comment on this!!!

SGC has no way of knowing the history of the 50 Roby. I understand your anger but it should be directed at Joe P and from what you have suggested, Probstein. By the way, I applaud your gathering the data and facts. Nice job.

He apparently also has over 9600 FB as "pank21", including over 400 purchases from Probstein between June 2011 and July 2012.

I'm flabbergasted!

David, first of all, let me say I applaud your research efforts.

I don't even know where to begin with this. In my line of work, we'd call this market manipulation. It's deceptive, immoral, and illegal.

I know PSA provides their opinion on an incredible number of cards, but how can they not see some of the alterations being made?

Is there any possibility that he established some friendships among other graders / people working for PSA and SGC?

No bump for you!!

BOUGHT

SOLD

http://i.imgur.com/6rMGlUV.jpg

A $600 increase.

BOUGHT

SOLD

http://i.imgur.com/fbuOyoi.jpg

One question for you guys: do the cards that are being posted in these different discussions sell often in Probstein auctions? Is it possible he sells an Art Shell rookie, and then sells another six weeks later, not recognizing it's the same card with a different grade? How many people are working for him? Or, is he doing the lion's share of work himself? Obviously I am not at all familiar with his operation beyond seeing his name on Ebay.

Am I being obtuse here?

I don't know exactly how many, but he has people working for him...

oops...already mentioned

Joshua,

It was mentioned above but Joe has long been gone from SGC. They should probably ask him to remove that from his facebook page.

Greg

The Gump Worsley "No Bump for you!" cards are not the same card. I would go back to the drawing board on that one!!

Wrong. They are the same card. I didn't think they were the same either at first, but if you spend enough time studying the two, they definitely are the same card.

Look at the bottom border notch under the "Y" in York.

Look at the white print spots next to the "L" in Lorne and just above the "N" in New.

Look at the rough cut right border on both cards. The line up exactly the same.

I believe it was cleaned before it went from a 7 to an 8, but it is definitely the same card.

The card didn't receive a bump to 8, but I do agree its the same card just cleaned up (particularly the print in the upper left corner and the mark just left of his crew-cut).

You are correct. I was thinking of the other one that did bump. Either way, yes, it looks like it was cleaned.

This is starting to look reeeeeeaaallllY bad.

kevin

Good detective work by the guys on this thread. Unfortunately, this is likely the very small tip of a very large iceberg.

http://tinyurl.com/ktskp86

Got this link from Joseph Pankiewicz Sportscards facebook page. If you click on the link you'll see Probstein is the seller and pank21 is the 3rd highest bidder. Those of you with facebook must be signed in to see his fb pages with info I believe. This thread has 100 views per response which is very high, will be interesting to see if anything comes from it.

I wonder what percentage of these upgrades are from cards purchased at shows with no scans to provide comparisons. I expect every major collector of graded cards has these alterations in their collection.

I wonder what they are doing to clean up these cards like this?

I admit I thought the Worsley were completely different cards for awhile.

Are they blasting the stray print marks with UV or something?

I have a great deal of admiration for the ethical people who alter cards and the ethical ebay sellers and auction houses who knowingly list them.

I think the real onus here is on the company who gets paid to detect these alterations-- and fails to do their stated job. They also get paid to grade accurately and consistently, another thing it seems they struggle to get right.

Call me crazy, but an authentication company should be able to authenticate. A grading company should be able to grade.

For your $5 a card, you aren't getting an FBI crime lab, you are getting a quick glance. And these cards are being doctored by experts. It is not realistic to expect grading services to stop every altered card that comes their way.

But it would be realistic to expect them to do a far better job than they are doing now. If they can't do it for five bucks, then charge ten bucks, or whatever it takes. But we should expect them to get it right.

And, I suppose it also would be nice if they didn't claim that anywhere between 2 and 5 of their grading experts didn't meticulously look at every card submitted...

Why? You have been the business a long time and acquired a great deal of expertise, what percentage of alterations by a first-rate card doctor do you think you could detect?

I suppose it's depends on what's actually being done to the card. If an alteration is being done in a way that can't be detected, or leaves no evidence on the card itself, I'm at a loss to determine what can be done.

I'm 61 and wear thick glasses, and have no formal training in detecting alterations, so the bar wouldn't be too high for me. But graders who are paid to grade and authenticate cards eight hours a day, five days a week, should be expected to attain a very high level of expertise. That's why collectors submit raw cards and send hundreds or thousands of dollars to them. If they don't have the skills to do it, they should find another line of work.

Nobody can be expected to do his work flawlessly, but based on the numerous threads on this board about altered cards getting into holders, and based on your comment that it is only the tip of a much larger iceberg, I would expect a whole lot more than what they are offering now. If that's impossible for $5 a card, charge $25 a card. Whatever it takes to get it right.

Barry, unless I missed it you don't market yourself as the world's leading expert at detecting them either do you?

Why should collectors expect them to get it right far more often than they do? Because they are a for-profit, publicly traded company advertised as "professional." Not advanced hobbyists, not just very experienced, but a professional who gets paid good money to get it right. That term means a lot to me, when someone brands themselves a professional. It elevates them to a level where a high success rate is expected. Those expectations should not be created if they cannot be met, in my humble opinion.

Now no human or company is absolutely perfect, and expecting zero mistakes or missteps is unrealistic I'll be first to admit-- but it is incumbent upon a professional grading and authentication service (or at least one that wants to last and be successful) to keep pace or stay ahead of the experts on the opposite end of the table, so to speak.

I am sure PSA and SGC are doing the best they can within the parameters of what realistically can be done for the fees they charge. But they are up against people with decades of experience in working cards who know all the tricks to avoid detection, and y'all can get on your soapboxes as much as you want but what you see is what you are going to get.

+1

People aren't wiling to pay $25 a card, Barry. If the TPGs could charge more profitably, don't you think they would be doing so already? All rational businesses charge the most they can.

On this thread and several others, we have the benefit of before and after pictures. The grading companies do not have them nor do they have the time to research each card submitted to see it's history. As has been suggested repeatedly, and for many years, many alterations are simply not able to be detected no matter how much time or money is being charged. Someone, maybe it was earlier on this thread, posted a quote from SGC on this very issues. Not every card has to go through massive restoration to go up 2 or 3 grades. Even a one grade bump can simply be the results of a grader being too tough at that particular moment.

You're probably right Peter, but if I had a choice to pay either $5 or $25, knowing that for the higher fee they were likely to get it right, but for $5 they might do a sloppy job, I would go for the deluxe service. That's me. Maybe I would send fewer cards in to keep the fees down. Not every T206 common with three creases needs to be in a holder. I would be more selective, that's all.

I'm not even downtown Brooklyn's leading expert. That's why I submitted cards and paid the fees, to take advantage of the graders' expertise.

Barry, even if they offered that option which they probably wouldn't because of the implication that they will do a worse job for $5, that only takes care of cards you submit yourself, and doesn't help at all in terms of buying cards already graded in the marketplace.

The whole inter-related marketing mechanism is amazing. People send cards in relying on expertise that has been demonstrated repeatedly to be very limited. Auction houses rely on TPG because it essentially allows them to wash their hands of grading and authenticity issues even though again the system is very flawed. It comes down to the fact that customers vote over and over again that it is more important what the slab says than whether there is really a high level of expertise behind it. As long as slab = liquidity it is going to be this way.

I have really come to think that there is a large group of collectors that don't care at all if the card has been altered as long as it "numbers."

Well then I guess what I can conclude is the TPG's don't really have the ability to detect alterations, and that the card doctors currently have the upper hand. So what are the grading services doing to combat this? How do collectors, and the industry as a whole, deal with this problem? This certainly doesn't bode well for the future.

That's exactly right Jeff. The slab gives everyone a free pass.

Collectors don't care enough to change things. Criminal deterrence is one possibility, but I am not sure how realistic proof beyond a reasonable doubt in this context is, even assuming a governmental body deemed this an important enough issue to devote lots of funding to, and even then, most card doctors and the auction houses that facilitate them have made a tremendous amount of money and can afford the best defense lawyers.

Hey no plugs. He can afford a banner ad.

I do believe Peter, that although we always say "buy the card, not the holder", a great majority of collectors do in fact swear by the label. If a card is trimmed but the label says 8, all is well with the world.

Do the police catch every thief or murderer? Does that mean we make sure that taxes no longer go to fund the police departments?

The ethical people who alter cards and the ethical ebay sellers and auction houses that facilitate them have made it a very difficult hobby to navigate for people who care to some extent about having unaltered cards in decent grades. The best I have been able to figure out is to scrutinize cards pretty carefully within the limits of my knowledge of how to detect alterations, to avoid certain sellers like the plague they are, and to VCP every card I am thinking of buying to see if it can be traced to one of those sellers. But I am sure it is only effective to a limited extent.

I am sure the grading services do the best they can, but the economics of the business, as well as the greater skills of card doctors, limit their effectiveness.

The police are a public service, whereas a TPG is a service being offered sheerly for profit. If police were to stop receiving funding, social chaos would ensue. A card grading company is not obligated to be funded by the people, who can simply choose an alternative if the service does not meet advertised expectations.

The real shocker i see here is the mental status of the buyers!
investors?, registry nuts in search of false glory?! i can't imagine a true collector paying over 14 times more for a card in a psa 8 holder even know
they're not capable of being able to tell the difference over a much cheaper
and absolute same looking psa7, you hear from many wanna be collectors say,
buy the card not the holder BUT this are the ones paying that crazy money
for that one higher grade!

So are you going to stop buying graded cards?

If I'm not mistaken, there are several members of this board who have contacts at PSA and SCG, and this specific issue has been brought to their attention. Thus, since fairly solid evidence exists that this person "Joe" is altering cards and submitting them for grading, I wonder why the folks at PSA or SCG don't ban "Joe" from making further submissions...

Peter, no, not at all. I will happily continue to collect. I just think that what sometimes gets lost in the discussion, with there being more than enough (deserved) blame to direct at the card doctors, is the responsibility of the TPGs to keep stepping their game up. That's all.

Often times they do charge way more than $5 for their service. Depending on the value and turnaround time requested, a single card can cost quite a bit more than single digits.

Everyone has their own expectations and tolerance for those expectations not being met. I respect those differences in all of us. To each their own.

That said, I'd love to have bosses or customers who look at my performance when it's off and simply say, 'That's okay, you are doing your best.' It's impossible to quantify or know how hard the TPGs are trying, which makes any healthy debate difficult. All we can see is some of what gets through, and some of what is grossly misgraded. I would actually agree that they get it right the vast majority of the time, so the question each individual has their own right to answer is: what success rate is expected.

What is your basis for saying they need to step up their game? Don't you think in a competitive market they already are doing the best they know how? And if you don't think they are and have no faith in them, why do you continue to buy their product?

I for one do not believe that the third-party graders Are doing the best that they possibly can!

+1

I suspect that the sellers, the consigners, the third party graders, the card doctors, are all in cahoots, and they all belong in the hoosegow. Dave.:(

+1

Well of course, but my point was that the people who are in charge with catching the bad guys do not always get them despite doing everything in their power. So what are the alternatives?

While I agree that is a crazy premium for an "8" over a "7", on that specific card there is more to the story. The O'Rourke card is one of the top 2 toughest cards in the set to get in a PSA 8 grade. Still a crazy price, but that explains the big premium being paid. Many collectors who choose to build that set shoot for all 8s.

Unfortunately, many will deal with it by choosing to leave the hobby. :(

Most likely because his checks clear. ;)

Increasing grading fees was mentioned earlier. I believe that a new pricing structure is in order. The fee to grade one of my Ryne Sandberg rookies should not be equal to the fee charged to grade one of my E105s. CPAs (are supposed to) charge tax preparation fees based upon the difficulty of the return. Insurance cost is determined by several factors. Why is grading not priced similarly?

It is, to a degree. PSA charges more to grade a $1000 card than a $100 card. The $5 grading fees being referenced are only for sub $100 cards, or so they state. Maybe the big guys get a different break.

The card doctors will always be one step ahead of the authenticator, much like the PED users are one step ahead of the enforcers.

Because, in theory, they spend as much time grading and authenticating a $5 cards as they do a $500. In their minds, same amount of work for each card = same grading fee for each card.

Their sigma level is where they can afford it to be, probably a 3 (93.3% accuracy). To lower it significantly would be cost prohibitive. The cost of raising their effectiveness to a 4 (99.4%) could possibly mean that the price per card that has been discussed would be a pipe dream. I would estimate it to be in the $75 range.

As someone mentioned, the higher price would preclude many lower end cards from being submitted. This would have the dual effect of reducing the cost and improving accuracy. However, the cost would still be much higher than the present, as the decrease in volume would necessitate an increase in margin.

As in everything in life, you get what you pay for.

Jack Welch and baseball cards, eh? :D:D:D

PSA: A valiant, but feable, attempt to detect altered cards or a con game?
 

From PSA's website:

The Advantages of PSA Grading

PSA provides expert analysis and protection for your collectibles. Using state-of-the-art, proprietary methods, the hobby's most astute and knowledgeable grading experts render carefully considered, unbiased third-party opinions of grade. When you see a card/ticket in a holder displaying the PSA logo, you can be confident that the card/ticket has been properly authenticated and graded by the experts at Professional Sports Authenticator (PSA). These are some of the attributes that have made PSA the largest and most respected third-party grading and authentication service in the world.

http://www.psacard.com/About/WhyPSA

I highlighted the word "confident" because the foundation of any con game is confidence. When people like myself have openly complained about doctored cards getting past the graders with credible proof, PSA has taken a very aggressive adversarial position against myself and others such as banning us from their message boards and club memberships and nothing has obviously been done to address the problem.

At what point does proven incompetence with no diligent attempt fix the problem encroach actions of fraud? What about causes of action such as gross negligence for failing to fix a problem that you are aware of or unjust enrichment which is unjustly profiting from fraud? As I've said many times before, you don't have to have purchased a doctored card to be a victim; card doctoring devalues good cards by artificially inflating the supply of the same cards.

I wonder if the people who've recently bought these altered cards are aware they've been altered??? If not, it wouldn't be too difficult to let them know.
I'm sure some of them won't be too happy knowing the card they just spent thousands of dollars on was recently altered by "Joe", and if they ever attempt to resell it knowing it's been altered, they could be also be held liable. I also think if PSA and/or SGC keeps letting "Joe" submit cards after knowing he has purposely altered them in the past, and another one of them "accidently" slips by their graders...well...let's just say I hope they have good attorneys. Perhaps a class action lawsuit is in order...